The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Oh what a week!!! Monday, of course Luke went back to school and it was that day that the children decided to become the Devil. I don’t know why that day, their schedule did not change and Luke is still gone the same time… Anyway this is my version of Erin and the terrible, horrible no good, very bad day… I mean week!

Monday morning I woke up to the smell of bubble gum and knew that it was going to be a very long day. I laid in bed trying to decide if it was really worth getting up. Brooke was still sleeping soundly Bree seemed to be happy in her crib and I all ready knew the gum was everywhere what could I possibly gain by pulling the covers off of my warm body and putting my feet on the floor just to be mad at the kids? Then that awful sense of responsibility hit like a ton of bricks. “If you do not get up it will only be worse and then you will have on one to blame but yourself” I said to myself. I had to say it out loud to let myself know that I was serious about getting up and taking care of the problem. I rolled out of bed and walked into the kids room telling myself over and over again that “They are Children of our Heavenly Father and they are just little, EVEN IF THEY DO KNOW THAT GUM IS A ABSOLUTE NO-NO!!!! What were those scout leaders thinking? Throwing gum out at that dinner was not a good idea”. I enter the war zone. I was right, Bree was happy jumping in her crib squealing in delight at the sight of her brother and sister seeing how many pieces of gum they could shovel into their mouths, of course they shared with her. My eyes darted around the room, “Oh, you have got to be kidding me I forgot to put the diaper bag up last night and now there is not only pink bubble gum but I can smell spearmint." Again I said out loud. I got Bree out of her crib and pulled her sheets off her bed and put them directly into the garbage can, along with her pillow, 2 blankets and a little play kitchen… ALL COVERED in gum. I was doing a survey of the rest of the room and Emma came in and said “Mom, Jeremy made a really big mess upstairs.” “Okay” I said “I will take care of it as soon as I have the gum cleaned up”. About five minutes later the smell of gum if over powered by the smell of Italian dressing. I walk up stairs to find Bree playing slip’n slide on the dressing covered floor. I think Emma was having her fun but came and got me before I knew she was an active participant. I was mad at this point. I put Jeremy in a kitchen chair and told him he was in time-out until I was done cleaning up the mess. I put Bree in the kitchen sink because there was no other place to put her. I got the mop out and saw a bowl with butter, cream cheese and formula mixed together. I kinda smiled to myself because the thought of eating that made me want to be ill. Did they think they were making something good? I got into cleaning and did not notice Jeremy sneak past me and head back downstairs. Emma, of course, came up and told me that Jeremy fed the fish and made another really big mess. “Okay” I said “I will take care of it as soon as I have the kitchen cleaned up”. Bree was wrapped in a kitchen towel as I made my way downstairs to rescue the poor fish. “WHAT DID you do?” I yelled as Bree starts to roll around and eat the fish flakes that are scattered all over the floor. The fish are swimming sideways. At this point I sat down in the middle of the floor and started to cry. Jeremy ran for cover as I am pretty sure he thought I was going to blow-up! I had a good cry and called Luke to talk me out of completely losing it with them. I got Bree cleaned up again, got the fish out of the tank, vacuumed the flakes up, fed the baby and got her back to sleep. Had a nice long chat with Jeremy and explained to him that if there was one more mess he would be spending the rest of the day in his room with no toys, gathered up the itty bitty pieces of my sanity and waited for Luke to get home. In between all of the mess cleaning I was trying to get a hold of Primary Children’s neurology department to get Bree an appointment…. That is a whole other story that I will have to get into another day. It was such a JOKE; I hate doctors, specialists and insurance people!

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday were all more of the same. Jeremy flushed a wash cloth down the toilet and burned up the septic tank pump, and because of the amount of trouble he was in has totally regressed in his potty-training efforts(if you are wondering yes, it was a lot of money to fix). I cleaned up a box of cereal that had been dumped out right before we had to leave to make it to an appointment, looked for HOURS trying to find the stash of gum with no luck; not even wrappers, tried to get laundry done (my efforts were futile!!), took Emma to get a new hair cut because she decided to chop off her own hair, cleaned up a graham cracker mess hidden under the bed, and spent a night and a day making new blankets, because our little Bree was having a really hard time sleeping without her blanket; the one that had gum matted into the cloth, and drove into Ogden 3 nights for Emma’s practice.
Friday was not as bad but I was totally exhausted and I was ready to run away from home never to return! However, Emma totally made it worth the driving! She was the cutest Tiny Tiger I have ever seen! Lets hope that this week goes a bit better; really life is not as bad as I just made it sound and I did get some adorable blankets out of the whole mess. Bree has her appointment on the 8th so we will be sure to keep you all updated on that. Thank you again for all the sweet comments and phone calls. It is nice to hear encouraging words when I am having a hard time coming up with them myself!
I did not get pictures of all the messes I kind of wish I had so when my kids have kids I can show my grandchildren what they need to do to their parents!!!

Graham Cracker Mess

Emma's Self-given Hair Cut... As you can see above, the bangs are a hard fix, but we can fix it with a hair clip... I love her new look, I was just upset about why it happened.
Brooke's New Blanket
Bree's New Blanket-- Sleeping much better :)






Here's to the class of 2001--OHSers :)





Our Tiny Tiger, sorry it is so jumpy. I kept getting bumped and it is a new camera. I am not really good with it!!

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

The moments that get me through weeks like that!!!

Bree is a great knee walker :)

Back to School

Luke went back to school today. This is worth noting because we will be 1/2 way done after this semester. It is very exciting to know that we are on the down hill!!! He will finish with a PhD!!! I am so proud of him, despite my complaining about him being in school for what seems like forever; I don't know how he does it.

What We Know

Thank you for all your support; all the phone calls, texts and emails. It has been kinda stressful. We don't know much at this point. Bree is doing fine, but the MRI did show a "growth abnormality" I don't know what that is I was in a bit of shock when her pediatrician called, and didn't think to ask. I thought we were in the clear because they did not have to do the MRI with contrast and we didn't hear right away from the doctor. I assumed that no news was good news. They are working her in for an appointment with a neurologist at Primary Children's... hopefully sometime next week.
Thank you again! Your thoughts and prayers are appreciated.
Luke and I are just trying not to think too much about it until we can get in to see the neurologist and know exactly what is going on.

An experience I wish not to repeat

Bree is a trooper... too bad her mom isn't. A MRI was suggest for Bree a few days ago because we got to wondering if she suffered a stroke at birth, and that is what is causing her lack of ability on her right side. Luke and I decided that if we needed to we should put her through all that.

It all happened so quickly, I didn't have much to do other than make sure Bree got down to Primary Children's. She couldn't eat before and they had to put her out with medicine that goes in by an IV. It was hard, but I did fine to hold her and comfort her. She fought going to sleep so hard that they ended up giving her a little more medicine than they thought she would need. It was so hard to watch her on the table saying mooooooooom; with every last bit of energy she had as the second medicine took effect. She was where I could see her but not be with her. Finally she was out and they started. Luke and I went back to the waiting room and waited for what seemed like a lot longer than half an hour. I admit it , I broke down in the waiting room. That seriously is just too much stress and worry for one Mom to take. My heart was so heavy and my mind was filled with worry. Every possible "what if" popped into my head every one but "what if it is all fine."

The tech carried Bree back into the recovery room and we waited 2 hours for her to wake up. I felt so helpless when I first saw her. Then I saw how peaceful she looked and I was back in Mommy mode just like that.

It was so funny when she came out of the anesthesia. She was pretty loopy, she couldn't hold her head up straight and had a hard time getting ahold of her sippy cup. On the car ride home she babbled and cried and was a little confused. We stooped and got her some ice cream and she seemed to do just fine. We go home and she staggered around as she crawled and sat on her own. I got up and checked on her every two hours to make sure her breathing didn't change. She slept GREAT! She is doing wonderful this morning, still a tiny bit woosy, but fine!

Now we just get to wait for the results and pray that it is all okay!

Nursery

Luke and I got called into the nursery last week. Big shock I know... since our family is nearly 1/2 the primary. We are excited and actually we have been wondering how long before 2 and 2 would be put together!
We have anywhere from 12 to 15 kids, and 5 leaders (including Luke and me). We get to teach this upcoming week, wasting no time getting into the swing of things! Wish us luck :)

Move over Taylor Swift...

Taylor Swift better watch out because a star has been born! We went to the Weber County Fair last Friday, and had a blast. Emmy saw some karaoke and thought it looked like fun. I didn't think she would do very well but WOW! She went right on up took the mic and sang her heart out to Tear Drops on my Guitar. She wasn't afraid and drew a little crowd. It made her Momma proud! She told us "I like 2 people and sometimes 3. I like Hannah Montana, Taylor Swift, Jonas Brothers... oh yeah and I sometimes like the Cheetah Girls." I can't tell you how excited I was that she just walked right to the front of the stage and put a smile on EVERYONE's face. The DJ was just dying! Way to go Emmy!! I had the video camera with me, but it had lost it's charge. I was heartbroken. Emmy said "That's okay Mom don't be sad, I will just do it again next time, okay?" Isn't she a cutie? After singing, Emmy and Jeremy won some prizes in a "catch-the-money" vault thing. Emmy did really well but Jeremy got in there and just put his hands up in the air and let the (fake) money blow around him, it was just so dang funny!

The fair was so much fun. We went with my Dad and my sisters... sorry mom, she had to work ;( Going anywhere with grandparents is fun! We walked in and hadn't been there for 3 seconds when Grandpa bought baseballs hats for all the kids! We saw all the animals and a horseshoe crab and stingray exhibit. We wander over to the quilts, paintings, etc. and agreed that my Dad should have entered a Quilt he made with all the Disney characters on it... what a domestic guy he is when there isn't any school to teach! We finally sat down for lunch and got to listen to a few people sing. There was a guy there "Wild Bill and the Invisible Band" Jeremy was dancing to cute it his music that Wild Bill lost his place! It was the cutest dancing I have ever seen! It was just so cute.After all that was over Grandpa got ice cream for everyone! YUM~ we love ice cream :) After our we were full, went potty/got changed and well rested we headed over to the carnival rides. That was fun but it started to get hot. We had be lucky that it was overcast and even sprinkled on us for a minute in the morning and afternoon. But around 3 it started to get HOT. We finished up the rides and head home. The kids took a short nap, then we head to the North Shore Water Park in North Ogden.

~Our fun new hats~

~Stingrays and Horseshoe Crabs~

~lovin' the animals~

~Ice Cream is soooo good!!~

~The all new Pop Star Sensation~

~The Money Vault~

~Hot, but fun~

Does anyone know about the new law that say you have to have anyone 3 and under in a diaper and plastic underwear cover... EVEN IF THEY ARE POTTY TRAINED??? I was so mad! Jeremy is, for all intents and purposes, potty trained. (I know exciting!!! he will be 3 in January... he beat Emma). That just puts him in a regression... Anyway, there was a sign out front telling the rules. Now we may have misread it but we were sure that it said you had to have a little swimmers and/or a diaper or plastic coverings. The people fought it and we ended up getting stupid plastic pants. I am not at all happy with this 'law'. ... but I was so ticked that they made me put my potty trained little boy in a diaper I understand WHY it is in place, and I can see the logic behind it. My Mom and I were talking about how irritated we were by this whole thing while we were changing the kids, and Emma said "Mom, I think the fair was more fun. You weren't so mad" . She speaks the truth and I stopped being upset and just followed the rule... We ended up have a lot of fun! I love taking the kids to the water park. Thanks mom for the fair tickets and the water park tickets! We had so much fun!!!!!

And after a VERY BUSY day....